The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has criticised President Muhammadu Buhari for his failure to appoint real tested and trusted statesmen and women and hard core patriotic technocrats as members of his cabinet but rather chose to nominate party loyalists most of whom failed as either state Governors or Ministers in the last cabinet.

HURIWA said that with the possible exception of a few, the remaining bunch are politicians with irreparable brand damages and persons who lack the desired qualities to turn around the battered economy if Nigeria and put the nation on the oath of economic growth and technological advancements.

The rights group further carpeted the President or padding up his list of cabinet level officials with an unwieldy and unusually expansive number even when public opinions over the years have been to the effect that the constitution be amended to trim down the mandatory number of 36 ministers from all the states of the federation to a manageable number with a view to cutting down the costs of governance.

HURIWA said Tuesday in a statement: “How can persons who were unable to consistently improve their people as Senators and governors be able to achieve the lofty ideals of actualising sustainable economic development which is what the Next Level mantra of President Buhari claims to be about?

“Some of these political liabilities will simply be sleeping on duty and gulping billions of national resources without adding any value to the body polity. Is this legacy of waste and redundancy what Mr President promised us?

“We wonder what the likes of erstwhile Osun and Bayelsa states governors would be doing in the soon to be inaugurated cabinet when in the case of the former Osun State Governor he could not pay civil servants in Osun State for nearly two years and still could not discharge this obligation even after picking up generous Paris Club refund courtesy of the magnanimity of his party leader and President of Nigeria.

“We will like also to know what has become of the encounter between the former Bayelsa state Governor and the Economic And Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) or has the President also glossed over these issues the same way he openly undermined the prosecution of Senator Danjuma Goje the moment he (Goje) accepted to step down and not contest for the Senate presidency against the President’s boy, Senator Ahmed Lawan? What about the extremely large number of allegations of fraud running to nearly $100 billion made against Akpabio by EFCC as Governor of Akwa Ibom State or has he been forgiven because he left the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressive Congress (APC)?”

HURIWA has also faulted the retention of some never-do-well cabinet level members in the last cabinet such as Babatunde Fashola who, as Power Minister brought the worst kinds of nationwide darkness never seen before since the amalgamation of southern and northern Nigeria by the British in 1914. Also the former Works Minister failed spectacularly to deliver any good measure of road infrastructure across the country apart from those media creations called roads which Babatunde Fashola brandished as his achievements. Transportation sector is in comatose, what then is Chibuike Amaechi coming to do since he could not even deliver on his mandate as transportation minister?”

HURIWA has also warned against making a rabidly partisan lawyer such as Festus Keyamo as the Federal Attorney General and Minister of Justice nor is there merit in retaining Abubakar Malami under whose watch court orders were violated by President Buhari with reckless abandon just as the rights group carpeted Buhari for nominating Chris Ngige who by all accounts lacks the composure to organise the Labour sector.

Update news